Biographies for Boyd County Kentucky
Judge George N. Brown, of Catlettsburg,
judge of the Sixteenth judicial district, was born September 22, 1822, on the site of Huntington, West Virginia;
was educated at Marshall and Augusta Colleges, graduating at the latter; studied law, and admitted to the bar in
1844, locating at Pikeville, and soon building up a fine practice; was married in 1857 to Miss Maria J. Poage,
who bore him four children. Judge Brown bears justly the reputation of being one of the ablest and purest jurists
of the Kentucky circuits; but largely extended that reputation by the firmness and integrity in his conduct and
rulings in the celebrated murder cases of Ellis, Neal and Craft. Only his resolute determination to enforce the
law in the face of the wild and infuriated passions of the people, who were maddened to mob violence by the nature
of the crimes committed, and a belief in the guilt of the accused, secured the partial administration of the legal
processes and punishment. By a like stern courage and inflexible will, the Floyd and Magoffin county frauds on
the public treasury were discovered and arrested, a service for which the auditor, in his report for 1883, said
that Judge Brown deserved the thanks of the State. In 1873-73, he was one of the commissioners to expend seventy-five
thousand dollars on the improvement of the Big Sandy. [The History of Kentucky, 1886 - submitted by
Shauna Williams]
Hon. Laban T. Moore, of Catlettsburg,
has ever been a consistent advocate and promoter of common-school education. He was born January 13, 1829, in Wayne
county, West Virginia, and mainly educated in the schools at Louisa, Kentucky, and Marietta, Ohio. He studied law
under Rochester Beatty, and attended Transylvania Law College, under the instructions of Judges Robertson, Woolley,
and Marshall, afterward reading with R. Apperson; licensed to practice in 1849. He next year married Sarah Everett,
of Cabell county, West Virginia. For his advocacy of a normal college, in 1857, he was beaten for the Legislature.
He was elected to Congress in 1859, and served during that exciting session. He recruited the Fourteenth Kentucky
Federal regiment, of which he was colonel for a time. He was elected to the State Senate in 1881, and has mainly
distinguished himself for his eminent and successful services in behalf of education, in that body. He was chairman
of the committee to redraft and revise the common school law, and was most prominently the author of the present
excellent law of Kentucky, a work of inestimable value to the future of the Commonwealth. Mr. Moore yet pursues
successfully the practice of his profession. [The History of Kentucky, 1886, submitted by
Shauna Williams]
Robert E. Hammond. An able lawyer
and influential citizen, Robert E. Hammond has been identified with Montana for
a quarter century and for the past ten years has had his office and residence in
the city of Havre. Like many successful men, he began life as a school teacher,
was a teacher in Montana during the territorial period, and by individual
ability and a fine integrity has attained his prominence.
Mr. Hammond was
born in Boyd county, Kentucky, September 17, 1859, attended the public schools
there, and then began teaching in his native county. In 1887 he came out to
Montana and continued his work of teaching in this state. He then took up the
reading of law with one of the well-known legal firms of Kalispell, and was
admitted to the bar in that city in 1902 and began his practice there. The
following year he located in Havre, and has since acquired a generous share of
the legal business of this city and vicinity. Mr. Hammond has the distinction of
having been a member of the constitutional convention which framed the first
organic law for the state of Montana in 1889. He represented Jefferson county in
that body.
Mr. Hammond's father was Robert Hammond, a
Virginian by birth, who came over the mountains into Kentucky and was connected
with the iron industry there. He was born in 1822 and died in 1900 at Boulder,
Montana, having come to this state during his later years. The mother was
Rebecca (Card) Hammond, a native of Pennsylvania who moved with her parents in
Kentucky, where she was married. She died in 1881 in Ohio, where she is buried.
Robert E. Hammond was married at Radersburgh,
Montana, June 12, 1889, to Miss Ella Ritchart, daughter of John Ritchart, of
Radersburgh. Mr. and Mrs. Hammond are the parents of two children; Lillian, who
was born at Radersburgh, July 7, 1890, is a graduate of the Hamline University;
Maurice Eugene, who was born at Kalispell, March 18, 1903, is attending school
at Havre.
Mr. Hammond is a member of the Masonic blue lodge
at Kalispell. In politics he is Republican, and his church is the Methodist.
During the busy years of his career in this state he has always been very fond
of outdoor life, especially of hunting and fishing. He has many warm friends in
different parts of the state, and has an unwavering affection for Montana and
its welfare.
[The
History of Montana by Helen Fitzgerald Sanders Volume 1 1913; Submitted
by Cathy Schultz]
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